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Associated Press – December 6, 2008:
A white social studies teacher attempted to enliven a seventh-grade discussion of slavery by binding the hands and feet of two black girls, prompting outrage from one girl’s mother and the local chapter of the NAACP.
After the mother complained to Haverstraw Middle School, the superintendent said he was having “conversations with our staff on how to deliver effective lessons.”
“If a student was upset, then it was a bad idea,” said Superintendent Brian Monahan of the North Rockland School District in New York City’s northern suburbs.
The teacher apologized to the mother who complained and her 13-year-old daughter during a meeting Thursday that also included a representative of the local NAACP. But the mother, Christine Shand of Haverstraw, said Friday she thinks the teacher should be removed from the class.
“I think the teacher should have gotten some discipline,” Shand said. “I know if that was me, I would be uncomfortable going back to that class. Why should my daughter have to switch?”
Monahan refused to say what, if any, measures were taken against the teacher, Eileen Bernstein, who was still working on Friday. The school district said she was not available for comment.
I liked the way school admin treated the black students’ parents like slave too–ignoring them and such.
more PC bs that is destroying this country from inside out. Americans have become soft…and we are going to get crushed by other countries like China. Unions, Lawsuits, PC, Religion, poor education,…a country is only as good and stron as its people…and this country is doomed. Im already learning to speak mandarin…everyone reading this should too, and teach your children to speak chinese too.
“If a student was upset, then it was a bad idea,” said Superintendent Brian Monahan of the North Rockland School District in New York City’s northern suburbs.”
So I guess that means they’ll stop dishing out homework as well? I mean, if one thing a teacher does upsets the students…
Give me a break. Our gym teachers did worse to people on a daily basis. God, life it rough, our kids are being raised to be blown over by the slightest breeze once they are adults.
Binding hands and feet? Discipline? Ohhh,I see -the bad kind.
It wasn’t like she made them pick cotton:
http://tinyurl.com/5kh695
It seems that almost every theme tried to teach second class citizenry has provoked controversy of some kind.
Maybe parents don’t want their children to experience what their great grandfathers practiced.
# 8 Mr. Fusion said, “It seems that almost every theme tried to teach second class citizenry has provoked controversy of some kind.”
I remember we had Slave Day at school. Students got auctioned to highest bidder & had to be that persons slave for the day. Proceeds went to charity.
Never a peep from parents. However, those were the days when the Principal had a wooden paddle hanging on his office wall. It wasn’t for show.
Fusion, that would work if it were White Students being cuffed, but only the blacks were (supposedly). You have a nice idea there, it just doesn’t fit our facts.
Now, #7 Special Ed made a funny. I think all==ie ALL including black, whites, and inbetween, should have day trips and pick cotton, peaches, etc. History might mean more if they did.
What would have happened if the Teacher was Black and the Students where White ????? Nothing
#11–ff==you are right and that fact pattern would be TOTALLY CONSISTENT with the issues of concern in this post.
So what’s your point?
Stupid teacher should have known better. Now if it were me I’d’ve picked the two most obnoxious yet not afroamericans from the class, then nobody would haved complained. I guess being non-racist and tolerant aren’t necessarily the same thing. I mean, if we all used ancestral history as an excuse for intolerence, we’d all have to kill each other.
“‘If a student was upset, then it was a bad idea,’ said Superintendent Brian Monahan.”
What if the exercise upset nobody? Wouldn’t that mean it was a bad idea?
Well, I’d say this is “bad”.
Except what if this school system is one of those where 75%-90% of the students are African American and there weren’t any other ancestry of students to choose from.
I think it was a pretty piss poor demonstration. Binding a kid’s hands and feet with tape and making them crawl under a desk is not an effective way to demonstrate what she was trying to demonstrate. I’m sorry, when they brought slaves overseas they didn’t bind them with tape and the slaves didn’t spend any time under a school desk in a clean classroom. Add to this the fact that the kids probably did get upset and it really makes me wonder about the teacher.
That said, the reaction to it is equally stupid. The best reaction wouldn’t be to call for the teacher to be removed from class. The best reaction would be a reasoned discussion about why the lesson was inappropriate and how it could be restructured to more effectively teach the lesson.
If I were tasked with teaching seventh graders about the trip slaves took between Africa and the US, I’d do it MUCH differently. I’d probably start by asking the kids how they think the voyage went, gathering their impressions and helping them to do the research to find out whether those impressions are accurate. They learn the lesson and probably a number of other things along the way and learn research techniques as well. Then I’d attempt to have them share what they learned with the rest of the class. My goal would be to engage the kids and empower them to take an active role in the learning process. If the kids learned something about how to take a question like “What was it like for slaves in a transatlantic voyage?” and turn it into an accurate answer I would judge the class a success.
Just reading about slavery with some pictures would have been sufficient. Or does every class need to be show and tell to get across to today’s kids?